Contrasting Citigroup (NYSE:C) & Huntington Bancshares (NASDAQ:HBAN)

Citigroup (NYSE:C) and Huntington Bancshares (NASDAQ:HBAN) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, valuation, profitability, analyst recommendations, earnings and dividends.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Citigroup and Huntington Bancshares, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Citigroup	1	5	11	0	2.59
Huntington Bancshares	1	5	12	1	2.68

Citigroup currently has a consensus target price of $73.00, indicating a potential upside of 6.17%. Huntington Bancshares has a consensus target price of $16.09, indicating a potential downside of 9.05%. Given Citigroup’s higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Citigroup is more favorable than Huntington Bancshares.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

71.7% of Citigroup shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 80.7% of Huntington Bancshares shares are held by institutional investors. 0.1% of Citigroup shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 0.9% of Huntington Bancshares shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

Citigroup has a beta of 1.44, indicating that its share price is 44% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Huntington Bancshares has a beta of 1.03, indicating that its share price is 3% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Citigroup pays an annual dividend of $2.24 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.3%. Huntington Bancshares pays an annual dividend of $0.62 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.5%. Citigroup pays out 64.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Huntington Bancshares pays out 59.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years. Huntington Bancshares is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Citigroup and Huntington Bancshares”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Citigroup	$156.82 billion	0.83	$9.23 billion	$3.45	19.93
Huntington Bancshares	$10.84 billion	2.37	$1.95 billion	$1.04	17.01

Citigroup has higher revenue and earnings than Huntington Bancshares. Huntington Bancshares is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Citigroup, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Citigroup and Huntington Bancshares’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Citigroup	4.70%	6.19%	0.49%
Huntington Bancshares	14.19%	10.72%	0.95%

Summary

Huntington Bancshares beats Citigroup on 11 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Citigroup

Citigroup Inc., a diversified financial service holding company, provides various financial product and services to consumers, corporations, governments, and institutions worldwide. It operates through five segments: Services, Markets, Banking, U.S. Personal Banking, and Wealth. The Services segment includes Treasury and Trade Solutions, which provides cash management, trade, and working capital solutions to multinational corporations, financial institutions, and public sector organizations; and Securities Services, such as cross-border support for clients, local market expertise, post-trade technologies, data solutions, and various securities services solutions. The Markets segment offers sales and trading services for equities, foreign exchange, rates, spread products, and commodities to corporate, institutional, and public sector clients; and market-making services, including asset classes, risk management solutions, financing, prime brokerage, research, securities clearing, and settlement. The banking segment includes investment banking; advisory services related to mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, restructurings, and corporate defense activities; and corporate lending, which includes corporate and commercial banking. The U.S. Personal Banking segment provides co-branded cards and retail banking services. The Wealth segment provides financial services to high-net-worth clients through banking, lending, mortgages, investment, custody, and trust product offerings; and to professional industries, including law firms, consulting groups, accounting, and asset management. The company was founded in 1812 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

About Huntington Bancshares

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated operates as the bank holding company for The Huntington National Bank that provides commercial, consumer, and mortgage banking services in the United States. The company offers financial products and services to consumer and business customers, including deposits, lending, payments, mortgage banking, dealer financing, investment management, trust, brokerage, insurance, and other financial products and services. It also provides 24-hour grace, asterisk-free checking, money scout, $50 safety zone, standby cash, early pay, instant access, savings goal getter, and Huntington heads up; digitally powered consumer and business financial solutions to consumer lending, regional banking, branch banking, and wealth management customers; direct and indirect consumer loans, as well as dealer finance loans and deposits; and private banking, wealth management and legacy planning through investment and portfolio management, fiduciary administration and trust, institutional custody, and full-service retail brokerage investment services. The company offers equipment financing, asset-based lending, distribution finance, structured lending, and municipal financing solutions, as well as Huntington ChoicePay. In addition, it offers lending, liquidity, treasury management and other payment services, and capital markets; government and non-profits, healthcare, technology and telecommunications, franchises, financial sponsors, and global services; and corporate risk management, institutional sales and trading, debt and equity issuance, and additional advisory services. The company offers its products through a network of channels, including branches and ATMs, online and mobile banking, and through customer call centers to customers in middle market banking, corporate, specialty, and government banking, asset finance, commercial real estate banking, and capital markets. The company was founded in 1866 and is headquartered in Columbus, Ohio.